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Special Jason Thornton Trail, 12th February |
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Written by Niamh Woods
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Friday, 03 February 2012
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SUNDAY 12th FEBRUARY at 11am
The Jason Thornton trail will take place on Sunday the 12th of February. The Jason Trail is a walk the scout group run every year in memory of a scout who was tragically killed in a hit and run. This year has special meaning to this event as it is 20 years since the death of Jason.
The Thornton Family and Group are hoping to get the biggest attendance yet and would like to remind everyone of the reason why we do the walk. As always the walk is to be a celebration of Jason and his life and in honour of this anniversary we would like to remind ourselves of who Jason was.
Click on read more below for more!
Jason Thornton was a 14 year old boy, who was the eldest of a family of 5 boys
and 1 girl. Along with scouts his second passion was music, he had a great love for music and played a guitar with friends who hoped to be the next big thing!! He was a student in Inver College who was preparing for his Junior Cert mocks which were due to start end of February.
Jason joined the cubs when he was 8 years old; he became a Sixer while in cubs.
From this he joined the scouts where he became a P.L. of the Eagle Patrol. He
loved every minute of his scouting experience, the more rain and dirt there was on
scout camp the more he enjoyed it. Jason had a great laugh and was always trying something new. He always had a plan!
He was a great patrol leader and always had his boys working well with him and there was always a plan! When things went wrong and they would fail in their task as a patrol, Jason would pull his patrol together and could always be heard saying "don't worry lads I have another plan". When patrol leaders court of honours were held Jason always was the one with the ideas and you could expect any idea to come from him the sky was the limit. He loved the night time adventures be it stalking in Kilrock or a night hike on an annual camp somewhere. Jason went on 3 annual camps to Avoca, Clairnbridge and Bray. He was always the life and soul of the camp never in bad form always dressed immaculate. He always turned out well on an inspection even after 12 days camping he took great pride in his appearance especially his hair. I know that Jason's love of scouting would have seen him going on to becoming a leader. He was a born leader and everyone he met always seem to attracted to his way of doing things. A true Scout loyal, trustworthy, helpful, friendly, courteous and kind.
On the 14th February 1992 he went on a P.L. training weekend to Mornington, outside Bettystown with the other P.L.’s from 3rd Monaghan Scouts and all the P.L.s from the Fane region. While on a night hike on Saturday the 15th he was tragedy killed in a hit in run accident. This as you can imagine was a horrific time for his family and for his friends who lost a loving son, big brother and a close friend. Two years later Jimmy Cunningham, his scout leader at the time, decided he would like Jason to be someway remembered by all his future scouts. So he decided to start up the ‘Jason Thornton Trail’ which takes place on the second Sunday of every February. The trail is in its 18th year where we remember him on his 20th Anniversary.
As always we will start the walk at the scout hall where one of the current Patrol Leaders will have the honour of leading. The walk will begin at 11am and lasts approx 2 hours. Part of the walk is through fields and forest, just as Jason would have wanted it so please dress appropriately.
Scout Prayer from Jasons days;
Dearest Jesus,
Teach me to be generous,
Teach me to love and serve you as you deserve,
To give and not to count the cost,
To fight and not to heed the wounds,
To toil and not to seek for rest,
To labour and to look for no reward,
Save that of knowing that I do thy holy will,
Amen |
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